


Goodbye, Good Luck, God Bless You

by GiveUpResistance



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - World War I, F/M, Gentleman's Club/Brothel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-14
Updated: 2016-06-17
Packaged: 2018-06-02 05:19:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 12,250
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6552613
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GiveUpResistance/pseuds/GiveUpResistance
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A girl sings, and a soldier listens.<br/>Alayne is just trying to survive in her father's club when Sandor Clegane, on leave from the front, walks in.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. May, 1919 - Part 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I started this almost a year ago, and simply never got around to finishing it until now. The rest of it should be coming soon, as soon as they can be edited, so if anyone wants to help me out that would be awesome tbh.  
> This is named after a WW1 era song.

_May, 1919._

Alayne stands on the stage, her back to the curtain. Her body is restless, but she forces herself to still as she hears the material rising behind her, and the music begins. A spotlight focuses on her, and she opens her mouth.

The material of her dress is silky against her skin, the beads clattering as her hand pulls one side up just a couple of inches, as if by accident, on its way to push at her hair. She takes special care to move her hips, lengthen her leg out to the side more than is needed as she turns, her voice just loud enough for the men to hear as long as they strain.

She can barely see past the lights, but Alayne knows that the room will be packed with customers, as her ‘father’s’ establishment always is. There are always men who will want a woman, and there are always men like Petyr who will provide what they want.

Alayne steps forward to where the microphone stands, close enough to the edge of the stage that the men in the front row will be craning their heads in hope of a glance up her skirt. She sings properly, now, beckoning to the men with her voice, with each movement of her legs and hips, with the practiced way her hands slide over her dress, just close enough to her breasts and upper thighs that it guarantees their eyes on her.

This close to the audience, she can make out some of their faces, their gleaming eyes as they stare, the occasional flash of a watch or jacket buttons as they lean forward.

It’s disgusting, the way that they look at her, a fantasy, but there’s no way to get out, nowhere to run.

 

Sandor steps off the train and pauses for a moment to take in his surroundings. It’s been over a year since he set foot in London, but the bustle is the same, if not more crowded than recent years. People still step out of his way after a glance at his scars, though, and now he has a limp to match.

Where to go is the real problem for the moment, however. Another man from his squadron recommended a boarding house that wasn’t too expensive or picky in their tenants, so he’ll probably try there. But it’s not too late, and all he has is a small bag with his few valuables. Going out wouldn’t be a problem, and-

Who is he trying to kid? He knows exactly where to go.

 

The building looks much the same as it did the last time he was there, and the doorman is the same one, too, and doesn’t flinch at the sight of Sandor’s face, just takes his money and steps aside.

A few yards inside the door he hears her, the voice that he has dreamed of for months, singing a song not quite as sweet as the one he imagines her calling when she’s beneath him.

He enters the main room and sees her, the only bright spot in so much darkness - quite literally, thanks to the spotlight - and she is even more beautiful than he remembers, her dark hair lighter, more red-brown and piled on top of her head. A few stray curls brush her almost bare shoulders, making him think of kissing the spots where they touch.

Gods, he wants her.

 

She’s been finding the notes everywhere for the last month. One was in a bunch of roses that had been delivered anonymously, then another in her powder puff and one perched up against her mirror. Before that they’d simply been left outside her dressing room and slid under the door, which the perpetrator had resorted to once more after she’d taken to locking her dressing room door at all times.

It made her feel safer, at least a little - safe enough to get changed once the show had finished and not keep any eye on the door constantly.

Alayne hangs her dress up carefully and wraps a robe around her scantily clad body. She sits at the vanity, the lights around the mirror brightening her face, though one of them is flickering. Slowly, she begins to wipe off the make up, the paints and powders that cover the slight smattering of freckles, the other blemishes on her ivory skin, darken her eyelashes and brows. The red of the lipstick goes last, the bright pout that attracts men so well.

She rinses her face with water, washing the last of her mask away, and turns her attention to her hair. It's starting to go limp now, that strands that were once curled hanging in loose waves. Alayne sighs, then reaches for a comb and pulls out the first pin holding her hair up.

There are two pins on the table in front of her when she hears something creak. The sound is repeated a moment after, confirming her suspicion that it's the floorboards in the corridor outside her dressing room. She stays absolutely still as the noise halts, directly outside her door.

Even if it's someone she knows, the door is locked, so she'll be fine. Her hand drifts to the top drawer on the side of the vanity anyway, simply as a precaution that she won't need, because the bolt-

The bolt isn't in place. The one time that she'd forgotten, and someone was at her door-

Two light knocks sound, and Alayne pulls the drawer open, gripping the pistol inside firmly. She takes care not to make a sound as she slides her chair back and stands, facing the door.

"Alayne?" A voice asks, a rasping sound that niggles at her mind, but the knob is turning and the gap between door and jam is widening.

"Don't move," she orders. "I'm armed." The door halts in its movement. "Push the door open, but stay still or I'll shoot."

There's a moment of silence, and Alayne pulls back the hammer.

The door begins to swing inwards.

She tightens her grip.

Only to release it again as an instantly recognisable scarred visage comes into view.

"Sandor," she says, breathing a sigh of relief and staring at her long lost man with something akin to wonder.

"Hello, Alayne," he replies, eyeing her pistol.

"Oh!" She quickly disarms the weapon and places it on the dressing table behind her.

Still he doesn't move, and she realises that he's waiting for an invitation. Alayne laughs in her mind and beckons him inside, letting the shoulder of her robe slip down her arm as she does so. She throws him the best of her sultry looks over her shoulder, turning to adjust her clothing back to its proper place. "Lock the door behind you," she says, and in the mirror she can see him grin.

No need for the gun tonight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please tell me what you think and if you want to edit the rest for me I would be forever grateful (plus you could read it before anyone else so??? you should totally do it)  
> I hope you liked it though


	2. February, 1916 - Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 1916 - The beginning of it all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much to all of you for your kind words, I hope you like this chapter as much!

_February, 1916_

A man in his unit is the one who recommends the club.

"A brothel?" Sandor asks him, only to be scoffed at.

"A gentleman's club, my dear sir," he says.

"I ain't a gentleman. Or a sir."

"Anyone with some money can get in. They like soldiers."

"Wouldn't a whore do just as well?" He says and Bronn laughs like its the funniest thing he ever heard.

"These girls are something else, Sandor. I've never seen a woman that invites you like they do, with their songs and looks - God, they just make you think of sex."

"But can you fuck them?"

"Most of them. You have to wait by the back door and they go with men they like."

 

And so now he's there. Two weeks leave, and he's wasting a night and a good amount of his money on this club.

It's much like he expected, extravagant furnishings and dim lights, men in good clothes drinking expensive booze and flirting with scantily dressed girls.

He has to admit that they're better looking than your average whore, better clothes and skin, with jewellery and smiles that truly seem to indicate joy, so they're at least better actresses than most.

He sees the attraction, he really does, as even the musical numbers aren't so bad, the girls in short skirts and often dancing provocatively, and the songs are lewd and filled with innuendo.

But he prefers the simplicity of prostitutes, where you pay for their service and it's done.

Until the room darkens and everyone goes quiet as a spotlight appears on the stage and the piano plays a few slow notes.

And __she__ steps into the light.

The way she moves isn't particularly sexual, and neither is her dress, a simple shift of blue. Her skin is pale, almost sickly so, and her dark hair seems to be braided in a coronet on her head.

But she's beautiful, her features delicate and with blue eyes that look out over the heads of everyone, looking so sad.

And when she sings it's like a little bird calling for others that aren't there.

He can’t take his eyes off of her, for all the while that she sings.

Bronn was right. They call.

 

The girl, ‘Alayne’, as she had been called, had performed only once more, the second time with couple of other girls. He stays and watches. of course, through the rest of the show, partly because he has already paid and he hopes to catch another glimpse of her. He overhears some of the other men talking about the stage door and remembers that the girls leave from there.

He wants to see her. He doesn’t expect her to notice him, unless it’s to gasp over his face.

He stays back in the shadows across the alleyway from the group of men waiting by the door, in fact, and waits as girls come out in groups of two or three, giggling and flirting with the men, sometimes throwing themselves at them, sometimes picking one out of the group to favour with their company.

And none of them are her.

Sandor thinks about leaving, decides upon it, but then the door opens once more and one of the few men left calls out ‘Alayne!’.

He can’t help but look, and he sees her hesitate in the doorway, dressed in a plain brown dress that does nothing to disguise her beauty.

“Come on, love,” a man says. “Have fun with us.”

She murmurs something and begins to walk away, but someone grabs her arm.

“Isn’t that what you’re here for?”

She tries to pull away, and Sandor can see that her eyes are wide and frightened.

Within a moment he has two shirt collars in his hands, pulling the men back. He stares at the last of them, the one holding Alayne's arm. "Let her go." He waits until the girl has wrenched her arm away before pushing the men towards the mouth of the alley. "Get the fuck out of here."

With a couple of curses, they slope off.

He turns back to Alayne to find her staring at him.

Shit. He hadn't given a thought to his face, simply moved to stop them from touching her. "You alright?" He asks gruffly, and she nods, still silent. "Good."

He turns, and begins to walk away-

"Wait!"

"What?"

"I- Thank you. For helping me."

He shrugs, and moves to leave.

“What’s your name?”

This makes him turn, for what possible reason she would want to know- “Sandor.”

In the dim light he thinks he sees her smile. “Thank you, Sandor.”

 

He returns the next evening, even though he hadn’t intended to, and it’s going to cost him more than he can afford. The man at the front door, though, takes one look at him and asks for his name.

When he gives it, he’s ushered in without having to pay. There’s no more preferential treatment inside, however, which is something of a godsend. He watches the show in peace, not really paying much attention until Alayne’s name is announced.

She’s in a different dress, with a different song and what might be a smile on her face. She’s possibly even more entrancing than the night before, her voice building with a hint of expectation, only to finish without closure.

He feels tortured.

Once the song is finished and the lights brighten again he gets up. He needs a fuck, and he isn’t going to get that here.

He’s most of the way through the lobby when someone calls out his name, there’s a swish of skirts and a hand grabs onto his arm.

“Royce said you were here. Are you leaving?” Alayne looks up at him with hopeful eyes, the blue so at odds with the darkness of her hair.

“I’ve somewhere to be.”

“Oh. Well, Royce won’t charge you, if you want to come again.”

Sandor frowns. “Why? All I did was stop a few men.”

“Well, that’s true,” Alayne admits. “But you didn’t ask for anything in return.”

“So what if I had?” he asks, prodded on by the lust in his veins. “What if I’d asked for what they wanted?”

She finally lets go of his arm, taking a step back, her face fallen. But then the corners of her lips turn up slightly. “But you didn’t.” She walks backwards, toward a side door. “Ask me again tomorrow night.” She swivels and darts through the door, leaving Sandor stunned.

Looks like he’ll be back again.


	3. May, 1919 - Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In her dressing room in 1919, Alayne has him again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry that it's been so long since the previous chapter, I'm adding the fourth chapter too to make up for it.  
> Also there's sex in this chapter.

_May, 1919_

Sandor’s weight is falling far heavier than one leg than the other, Alayne can see. “It’s been a long time.”

“Aye,” he says, still limping towards her.

“Eighteen months. And it’s been six since armistice.” She begins to pull the pins out of her hair again.

“I was shot just before then. They didn’t take my leg, but it didn’t heal well.”

Oh.

Alayne turns, about to apologise, but he’s close enough to her that he grabs her waist and pulls her to him, her hands caught against his chest, and he stares down at her for a moment before pressing his lips to hers. She feels her body relax, mouth opening so that he can slip his tongue inside, and she manages to slide both hands up to his neck, pulling herself higher. His fingers are in her hair, dislodging the pins and letting the long tresses slide free.

They list to the left and Alayne pushes Sandor away long enough that her feet are fully on the ground.

“My leg’s-”

She kisses him lightly and then backs into her dressing table, shrugging the robe all of the way of her shoulders, letting him see her body for the first time in months.

He grins and moves forward, using one hand to cup a breast through her brasserie and resting some of his weight on the other. “These are bigger,” he says, eyes glinting as he softly squeezes.

“Maybe you’re thinking of some other woman,” Alayne jokes, but he unties the ribbons behind her back and slips the garment down, baring her chest completely.

“No, definitely yours,” he says, voice even rougher than usual, and lowers his head to brush his lips against her skin, his teeth, mouth enveloping her nipple, tongue laving at her skin, while his hand massages at her other breast all the while.

She widens her legs, slides herself up onto the table properly and wraps her legs around his hips until she can feel his hardness through his trousers and her thin drawers. She presses against him, rubbing the seam of the wetted material against herself.

His mouth leaves her and his hoarse voice sounds her name.

Alayne takes his head in both hands and brings it upwards, kissing him while his hand drifts down her back. She untwines her legs and unties the drawstring of her underwear. Sandor takes over as soon as the knot is released, sliding the material down her thighs and all the way off of her legs.

As his hand returns to the juncture of her thighs, his fingers sliding in the curls there, she reaches for the placket of his trousers, undoing the buttons and sliding out his member. His fingers curled inside her, thumb teasing the nub of pleasure until she pulls him towards her. His hand leaves her, ending up on the table just behind her rear as she guides him inside her.

Though it’s tight, it’s better than she remembers, having him fill her, hard body parting her legs, hard cock parting her cunt. Her breasts press against his chest, the tender skin tingling with each abrasion by his shirt.

After a few moments he rocks back and in again, and Alayne lifts her legs once more to encircle him, taking one hand up to his neck and the other falls to the table surface beside Sandor’s.

They fall into a rhythm, Alayne meeting every thrust as hard as Sandor makes it. His mouth finds hers, but the angle is awkward and Alayne settles for staring into his grey eyes as her body tightens. A wound feeling in her lower regions increases as Sandor’s movements become more erratic, finally spilling himself inside her.

His breathing is heavy as he relaxes and withdraws from her, his lips twisted down in a frown. “I’m sorry,” he mutters, a couple of fingers dragging their way along the outside of her thigh.

“What for?”

“I promised that I'd take my time."

It hadn't been a promise, as she recalled from all those months ago, but something more like a threat, made during their last, rough , coupling, up against the door of her dressing room on the morning that Sandor was to leave for the front once more. After a night together, laying on the floor of her room, he'd let her dress before flipping up her skirt and taking her from behind, hands roving her body and each thrust of his hips driving him deeper inside her, speaking all the while in a rough tone that made her squirm almost as much as the fingers on her clit.

He'd never promised, not truly, never even said 'when I come back', but next time. _Next time, I'll be slow. Next time, I'll lick your cunt until you scream._

Which were the words that had brought her over the edge, and fuelled a good many restless nights the first months after he'd gone. Until...

"Alayne?" Sandor asks, bringing her back to the present, a hot blush on her cheek at the remembrance.

"We'd better go somewhere more comfortable if you're to make good on that," she says, sliding off of the table surface and collecting her underwear from the floor.

 

Once they're dressed and tidied, they catch a cab to the hotel where Sandor is staying. He can hardly believe that this is truly happening again, that Alayne will have him as a lover even after the war is over, after all the time that it took him to return to her. He's always been a man with an ugly face and a worse temper, and now he's a cripple too.

And when she realises his disability she simply makes it easier for him to fuck her.

Even in her plain dress, no embellishment or hair or face, she is beautiful, more so than Sandor could ever have hoped for, even in a woman that look at him without disgust, let alone allow him into her bed with such enthusiasm.

Though he has never really understood how Alayne’s mind works.


	4. February, 1916 - Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Back 1916, Alayne goads Sandor.

_February, 1916_

He sees her that night, floating in his vision as he brings himself off in a nearby alley, and then again in the boarding house. He sees her pale face and blue eyes, her lips smiling that last little smile as he comes. He can feel her hand sliding over him, imagine how it would be to sheath himself in her sweet, slick cunt, or have her swallow him down.

By the gods, Sandor wants her.

But she confuses the hell out of him, too. She’s gorgeous, and young, and obviously popular at the club, but she has turned away handsome men, only to speak to him as if he was worthy of something more than a quick fuck with an alleyway whore.

And she is obviously more than that, and apparently not a whore at all, from the way that the men had spoken to her and her reaction to them.

Thinking about it makes Sandor’s head ache, although that could have more to do with the alcohol he has consumed.

But he can’t sleep, keeps wondering why she told him to come back to the club, why she has responded to his warning with a provocation. What difference could there be to her answer on the morrow? A night would not take away his scars or his nature, or make a girl, seemingly with neither the need or will to take even a better man to her bed, change her mind for one without looks or charm.

 

Alayne is tying up her hair when Ros pokes her head around the door.

“That man of yours is here,” she says, wrinkling her nose. “I don’t know why you’ve taken a liking to him, though. Those scars…” she shivers dramatically.

“They’re just scars, Ros. And he was nice to me.”

“Plenty of men are nice to you, love.” Ros closes the door behind her and takes Alayne’s dark hair in her hands.

“Because they want me. And they’re not nice, not really, they just tell me of all the things that they could give me.”

“That’s what men are like.”

“I know, Ros. I’ve been here for more than a year. But he helped me and left without trying anything at all. I want to at least thank him.”

Ros frowns at her in the mirror. “Well, you convinced Royce to let him in for free without letting Baelish know. What more can you do, aside from giving him your virginity?” She says the last with a scornful tone, but Alayne can’t help but flush.

“Alayne-” Ros starts, but the girl pulls away and turns to face her friend.

“What’s the point of my virginity, Ros? Petyr isn’t selling me, but he looks at me like the other men do. I don’t want to be his.”

Ros seems torn as she bites her lip. “I understand that you want to have some kind of control, but you’re not like us. You’re a lady-”

Alayne shakes her head vigorously. “No, Ros. I’m just any girl now. Everyone else is gone. And I want to have some kind of freedom, for once in my life.”

Finally, Ros nods. “Very well. I wouldn’t expect him to be gentle, or kind, when he fucks you.”

“I know,” Alayne replies. “But it will have been my choice.”

 

Sandor sits hypnotized through Alayne’s two performances. Somehow she becomes more and more alluring every moment that he watches her, but he can’t look away, and when she leaves the stage everything feels empty.

He’s still affected when a red haired whore saunters over and plumps herself down on his lap.

“No thanks,” he snarls, but the woman just laughs.

“Sure you don’t want me, lad?” she says, and then under her breath mutters, “Alayne’ll meet you at the back door in a few minutes.”

It takes a few seconds for her words to sink in, and then he pushes her off roughly. “I said no,” he says loud enough that the few people nearby can hear, and stalks away and out of the building completely.

And then sneaks back down the alley to wait for Alayne.

She pokes her head out of the door, and smiles when she sees that he’s alone.

“Sandor,” she says, slipping out of the door and towards him.

“What do you want?”

Her smile doesn’t falter. “To talk to you.”

“You already thanked me.”

“I know. But you’re here anyway.” She slides a slim arm around his and tugs him toward the street.

“You’re beautiful. I’m hardly going to push you away if you won’t go. And I want to know how you’d answer my question.”

“Well, I’m flattered that you find me beautiful,” she says. “Some men find me too tall and too skinny.”

He looks down at her, sceptical. She’s tall for a woman, that’s true, but he still has the advantage of several inches. Her body would fit him well, hardly needing to bend to kiss her, and her legs are easily long enough for him to fuck her while hardly lifting her. And she’s slim, but the swell of her breasts is obvious, and her dresses on stage cling to her form like a second skin.

“You’re the perfect height,” he mutters, dipping his head slightly so that he can speak directly into her ear, beyond earshot of the men passing them by. “I could pin you against a wall and slide into you with no problem, fuck you while you’re still standing. What if I‘d asked for that?”

Alayne’s face if flushed pink, a lovely shade that Sandor wants to bring to her face over and over again, but her grip on his arms loosens slightly and he readies himself for the moment that she steps away.

“I might-” she begins quietly, and Sandor barely hears, but his heart begins to beat like he’s in the middle of a charge. “I may say yes.”

“Don’t be a fucking tease,” Sandor snaps. “You act like an innocent, wouldn’t even give good-looking men a chance to have you. I’m a soldier, a poor one at that, so even if you were a whore you’d be too expensive for me.”

“You’d refuse to fuck me?” she asks in a small voice. “I’m not desirable? Or are you not… wanting a woman.”

He stops, grabbing her arm, and stares into her eyes as they stand halted in the middle of the pavement. The blue orbs are challenging, daring him to let her words goad him. And he lets them. He doesn’t have the patience to tolerate her.

He begins to walk again, pulling her roughly after him and into the next alleyway and far into the darkness.

“I want a woman, alright. And I warned you, you little fool.”

Sandor backs her into a wall and kisses her, holding her head in both hands, fingers tangling in the dark hair. Forcing his tongue into her mouth he increases the pressure and is surprised to find her kissing back with passion. Her small hands find the front of his shirt and grab it, pulling him as close as possible.

He lets one hand slide down her back, making her arch into him, before cupping her buttocks and squeezing.

She tenses, but doesn’t push him away, though he can feel her thigh warm against his erection, hardening him further.

Slowly, he untangles his second hand and still she remains locked to his mouth, sliding her own hands upwards to curl around his neck and force him to continue the kiss. _Perhaps she isn’t as unknowing as he had thought, as her eyes made her seem_. His hand moves to her front, grasping her breast and kneading for a moment before pulling down the front of her dress to free her chest.

He runs a thumb over the bared skin and teases the bud that tightens in the centre, causing her to release his mouth to take a gasping breath. Sandor takes the opportunity to move his lips to the defined line of her jaw, moving upward until he can gently close his teeth over her earlobe.

“Sandor,” Alayne moans, and he sucks hard against her neck in response. The hand that had been on the soft curve of her ass creeps down her leg and around to push up the front of her skirt.

The skin of her inner thigh is soft against his callused fingers, and as they draw further upward her legs pull together, halting his progress.

“Open for me, little bird,” he breathes in her ear. “Let me touch you, stroke you-” Her legs open once more and his fingers find the curls of hair. The outside lips of her cunt are already wet, and she gasps when he glides a finger over her opening.

 

Alayne isn’t sure if she wants Sandor to slide his finger into her as he almost did or not, but his fingers end up at the peak of her sex, where her hair ends, and tease the bud there, sending a thrill of sensation through her. He’s murmuring in her ear between bites and licks of her neck, words of desire and appreciation as he teases her.

Finally a finger slides inside her and she can’t help but tense up, constricting around him. She can feel every inch of the intrusion, and it’s not unpleasant, but his thumb presses against her peak and his other hand pinches at her breast and his tongue slides over the edge of her ear and she can’t help but sigh and relax.

She can feel his hardness against her thigh, a burning length that he grinds against her. She grips his shoulders hard and manages to lift herself far enough off the ground that she can press her leg against him, rubbing against the bulge in his trousers as much as the limited room will allow.

She feels his finger withdraw from her and his hand disappear, and she tries to protest, only for his thumb to return, to abuse and pleasure her once more, and she’s being filled again, this time with two fingers and he moves them as he did the previous one. He uses her fingers to fuck her with delicious intent, pushing her higher and higher until her body tenses and her fingers dig into Sandor’s shoulders. Gasping for air, she climaxes, the large man that is holding her the only thing to keep her from collapsing.

“I warned you,” she hears through the haze clouding her mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll try to have the next chapter up quicker than the last break.


	5. May, 1919 - Part 3 & November, 1917 - Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In 1919, Alayne keeps a secret. In 1917, they see each other once more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mystery! More sex! Unanswered questions!  
> Will I ever stop talking like a reality show presenter?  
> Yes!  
> Now, in fact. I finished all the work I was going to be able to do tonight and thought I'd update this. If I can finish all the shit I'm supposed to do I'll try and update again after the next GoT episode.

_May, 1919_

Alayne slips into the bathroom of Sandor’s hotel room with the excuse of wanting to clean herself up, but as soon as she’s inside she pulls a note out of her shoe.

She had found it slipped underneath her dressing room door while she was dressing, and hidden it before Sandor could notice. It scared her that it had been left while she and Sandor had been together, that they could have heard, providing whoever it was that was sending these blasted notes something more to torment her with.

She opens it with shaking hands and reads the neat lettering.

July 29, 1918

Her heart is beating far too hard in her chest and she can hardly breathe.

They can’t know. It’s impossible, for only two people know the meaning of that date, and Ros would never betray her.

But it’s there, in bold black letters, and _someone knows._

There’s a knock on the door and Alayne is startled back to reality. Quickly, she tears up the note and throws it in the sink, splashing water over her face as she watches the last of the pieces disappear.

“Alayne,” Sandor begins as she opens the door, but pauses when he sees her. “What is it?”

“Nothing, I’m just- I’m so tired.” This is true, and a headache is beginning to form. “I should go.”

“You’re welcome to stay.”

She stares at him for a long moment before finally nodding.

One by one, she lets her clothes drop to the floor, and climbs into the bed, naked but for her drawers, and the feel of Sandor’s eyes. It’s comforting, rather than the nauseating gazes of the men in the club.

He joins her after a minute, and she can feel her breathing calm with his arm across her stomach and her back up against his chest, a warm and solid haven.

She feels safe.

 

 

 

_November, 1917_

Alayne opens her dressing room door, yawning. It had been a long few days, and she hadn’t been able to sleep properly, which affected her work, which affected her sleep…

She switches on the light and jumps at the sight of someone in her chair.

But it’s a familiar form, familiar face, and she can’t help the smile breaking over her face. “Sandor!”

“Aye, little bird,” he says. “It’s me.”

He catches her up in his arms and they share a long kiss, tongues delving deep and bodies pressed up close to each other.

“Want me already?” Alayne asks playfully when Sandor releases her, and splays her hand over his groin.

“I always want you,” he replies. “You’re more brazen.”

“I’ve been thinking about you,” she admits, a little shyly, because it’s true, she has been thinking about him. And dreaming.

And worrying, if truth be told.

“Should we start with everything that I’ve been imagining doing with you, then?”

Alayne grins and kisses him briefly, but she knows that the club is not the best place. “We can’t do anything here, Sandor. Littlefinger can’t find out.”

“Who the hell is Littlefinger?”

“He owns the club,” she explains. “The only men allowed back here are employees and clients, and you’re neither of those things. And if he knew I had a lover…”

“You’d have to take clients?”

Alayne bowed her head. “I want you, and I want to be with you right now, but-”

“You can’t risk it.” Sandor takes her chin in his hand forcing her to look up at him. He doesn’t look pleased but there’s resignation in his eyes. “I’ll see you later, then. Could you meet me at the boarding house?”

“I think so.”

“Good.” He kisses her one last time and disappears out the door, leaving Alayne to prepare for the coming evening.

 

 

 

_May, 1919_

Alayne comes to with a thrill of pleasure and Sandor’s mouth on her cunt. Her drawers are gone, and his hands are stroking her thighs as his tongue strokes her cleft.

“Sandor,” she says, half a gasp as he delves particularly deeply, half a recrimination after disobeying her wishes from the night before - although her anger is fleeting, disappearing with any thoughts of fear and doubt.

“You’re awake,” he replies. “Finally.” He suddenly leaves her, twisting to the side and moving up the bed slightly. “Come on,” he tells her, and rolls her with him.

Suddenly she is on top, and Sandor has a grip on her waist and is pulling her up until her knees are perched either side of his head and he can lower her until his mouth meets her once more.

This might be heaven, she thinks, although in heaven it might be easier to keep herself upright.

He makes short work of her, and soon she is boneless and breathless from her climax. She doesn’t much mind when Sandor lifts her again and slides inside her, but when she regains some control over her limbs she finds that this position is a damn sight more easy to control, and she uses that to her advantage. Her fingers lock in the dark hair of his chest as she rides, and she manages to bring herself off a second time in the process of pleasuring him.

When they’ve recovered their breath and Alayne is wrapped in Sandor’s arms, she hears him ask quietly, “Are you annoyed? You said that you were tired-”

“Well, you made sure that I wasn’t by waking me up this way,” she says, laughing slightly. “But I would have let you even if you’d woken me up and asked.”

“I hoped so.” After a moment or two of silence, he says “Your red hair is growing in.”

“I know,” Alayne grimaces. “I need to dye it again.”

“Will you tell me why?”

“One day,” she promises. “One day I’ll tell you everything.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is what is going to happen really obvious? I can never tell.  
> i.e. gimme some feedback!


	6. November, 1917 - Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In 1917, Sandor craves her, like some men crave opium, like he once craved wine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I haven't watched the most recent ep yet because I've got too much coursework but y'all are so nice and smart that I wanted to update anyway. I'm sorry that this chapter is a bit short, though.

_November, 1917_

Sandor has been lusting after Alayne for almost two years.

He knows that he’s a fool for doing so, for being so, but it’s impossible to get her out of his head. He can’t forget the way that she’d come apart for him in that alleyway, and then accompanied him to his boarding house the following night and given herself to him, shy and provocative, an innocent with sweet kisses of desire.

She’d sung for him, when they were alone in his room, a song of goodbyes and no regrets.

And he has remembered the sound of her voice, held onto it through the mud and blood and gunfire, the shelling and the bits of men. His little bird has carried him through this mess of a war, all the way back to her.

He has to force himself not to go straight to the club, to get some rest before seeing her, but he only manages to sleep a couple of hours and then it’s too late to try and see her. He falls asleep once more, for a few more hours, and then he can’t wait anymore, he needs to see her as soon as physically possible.

The club is shut up in the mid-morning, no one around, so he picks the lock on the back door and sneaks in, heading for Alayne’s dressing room.

He can smell her scent in the chamber, can see her in the dresses that lie across the chair and hang from the rail along the wall. Her cosmetics are spread over the table, scissors and sewing needles placed daintily on top of a folded garment.

He doesn’t know how long he sits, drifting in and out of sleep, but finally the door opens and there she is, real and not-real, his lovely little bird in his arms again.

He understands why he can’t stay, but it frustrates him, after waiting so long.

 

Later, in his room, he thinks of her and gives himself some relief, but it’s nothing like when she arrives and falls into his arms, and he falls into her. He’s craved her, like some men crave opium, like he once craved wine, and his hand is no substitute, even with her on his mind.

 

When they lay together in the bed he remembers something that he has been wondering for a while. “Why don’t you take clients?”

Alayne tenses. “That’s not a very polite thing to ask.”

“I never said that I was polite.”

She sighs. “Why do you want to know?”

“One of the men in my battalion, the one who told me of the club - when I wouldn’t tell him my favourite girl he just talked about all of you, and he said that you had never let a man near you, not that he knew of.”

“And you want to know if it’s true?” There’s a calm in her voice that he hadn’t expected.

“I want to know why me.”

“I’ve told you,” Alayne says, sounding frustrated. “You were kind, when no one else was, and you helped me and asked for nothing. And you are handsome, even if you think you’re not, and you have _never_ given me a reason to regret making my choice.”

“Not regretting is hardly a good reason-”

“It’s far better than regretting a lack of action. And I wanted you, and I wanted someone who wanted me and didn’t lie their way to my side.”

“Has someone-”

“No, I-” She sighs and sits up, leaning against the wall. “Littlefinger only makes me sing. I think because he wants me for himself, but he’s never made any move, just looks at me. And…”

He wants to kill this man already, and the pause makes the air feel thick.

“He’s my father,” she gabbles, then; “No, but I call him that, and he loved my mother and he fed me and kept me in shelter and all I had to do was sing and I _hate_ him-”

Her fingers are clenched into fists and her eyes are blazing and he takes her into his arms.

“I’ve killed men, Alayne,” he says. “And not just in the war.”

She laughs at that, and kisses him, and says, “I’ll let you know if that’s ever necessary.”

 

She comes to him on the fourth night of his stay, as she has every night, but this time her eyes are gleaming and she announces, “Littlefinger has just left, he’s going to his estate out east, won’t be back for days.”

He spends the rest of his time at the club, kissing her in the dressing room between her songs, teasing her with words and fingers until they’re both hot and aching.

He relishes each moment he has with her, fixes it firmly in his memory so that it lasts him either until he comes back, gods know how long from now, or until he dies.

They spend the last night in her dressing room, and he knows he leaves her sore in the morning but it’s worth it, and at the station he kisses her like it’s the last time he ever will because for all he knows it could be, and if he has to die then he’d rather it with her face in his head and memory of her body against his.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> At least there's no more or less mystery this chapter probably??? I guess you guys sort of like that though, so don't worry! There's even a sort-of cliffhanger next chapter! Yay!


	7. May, 1919 - Part 4 & June 1919 - Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alayne tells Baelish about Sandor - in a way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I finally finished my assignment and watched the new episode - I'm so happy that stuff is happening! And Sansa and Jon reunite! It kinda makes me want to start writing the sequel for this again, I'd decided not to do it but I'm not sure now.  
> Anyway I hope y'all like this chapter, there's only a few more to go.

_May, 1919_

Seeing Littlefinger is one of Alayne’s most detested activities, but this time she needs something, so she goes to his house in her second-best dress (the best is to be saved for Sandor from now on), and asks to see her father.

She is shown into his study, and he comes out from behind his desk and kisses her on the cheek and the mouth.

It is only with great difficulty that she doesn’t flinch away or stiffen in his grasp. _This is for Sandor_ , she thinks, and that gets her through.

“You’re looking well,” Petyr is saying, his hand brushing a few strands of hair behind her ear.

“Well, I might not be if not for some good fortune,” she says, trying to seem a little on edge, as if what she is about to say was true, or at least true of the night before, and not three years ago. “Last night, some men tried to…” She bites her lip and looks at the floor.

“Who were they? Did they hurt you, did they-”

“No,” Alayne says, meeting his furious eyes and hugging her arms around herself. “A man stopped them, made them leave.”

“Thank god,” Littlefinger says, and he sounds genuinely relieved, which Alayne doesn’t doubt, but the way he embraces her makes her sick. “I’m so glad that you’re alright.”

“So am I,” she says, “But what if they come back?”

“Don’t worry, my darling,” he says firmly. “I’ll make sure that you have protection from now on.”

He’s playing into her hands quite nicely, and Alayne makes sure to look quite grateful as she says, “I wish I wasn’t such a bother to you.”

“It’s really no problem, my love. I can’t let my only daughter be hurt or threatened.”

_Other than by you?_

She kisses his cheek and lets him call for tea.

She’s eating her third biscuit when she ‘recalls’ the second part of her request. “Oh, and Father, the man who helped me-”

“Yes?”

“He didn’t ask for anything, but I felt it was only fair that I offer him some sort of reward, and I thought that you wouldn’t mind, but I should have checked with you first but I was just so grateful- I didn’t name an amount though, so whatever you think best.”

“Of course, Alayne,” he says soothingly. “I would like to thank him for keeping you safe. And I’m sure that I can decide on suitable payment. What was his name?”

“Oh.” She pretends to think on it for a moment. “It was Clegane. Sandor Clegane.”

 

Littlefinger must be pleased by Sandor’s size and strength and supposed ugliness, for Sandor tells her that his interview with him seems to go fairly well, and the next day Petyr calls on her to say that Sandor will be protecting the girls of the club from now on.

Her lover is good at playing the sullen guard, disinterested in the workings of the house and irritated by the girls, particularly Alayne.

Not that he needs to, not really, because some of the girls recognise him from their trysts and the others don’t particularly care. And all of them will keep their secret, for Alayne keeps theirs. Although Ros says that for some it’s not out of love for her but their knowledge that if Littlefinger knew that Alayne had a lover, she would have to service the men like the others, and that would undoubtedly take custom away from them.

It’s not an inflated sense of self that makes Alayne believe it, it’s simply the truth - men like her, and when they can’t have her after she gets them aroused then they’ll take the others, and pay them for the pleasure.

So Sandor keeps an eye on the back door and stops men who haven’t payed from coming in, and escorts her from the establishment at the end of the night, and they can sneak kisses in dark corners and empty corridors.

She invests in a french pessary and drinks moon tea to be safe, because if she’s learnt anything-

The notes are still coming, more vaguely threatening than the one that frightened her that first night when Sandor returned.

She’s trying to be happy with what she has, and she is, oh gods she is, because Sandor is here and he’s alive and he cares for her. Things haven’t been this good since before the war, and she’s determined to make the best of it.

She sings with all her heart, sings for the man backstage, always throwing him a wink and a smile during her performance.

She sings like the song is everything, like it’s warming her skin and her flesh and her bones, sings with the thought of Sandor in her mind, Sandor loving her and kissing her and filling her, and when the song is finished she heads straight to his arms and in her dressing room a minute later they’re both surrendering to ecstasy.

There is nothing she has ever wanted so much as she wants him, and he’s hers and hers alone, and she is his, and though he’s never so much as hinted towards words of love, she figures that she doesn’t need that, not as long as he is beside her.

And sometimes she feels guilty, because she has lied, or at least not told him everything, and he knows of the existence of only part of her secrets, and she wants to tell him but the notes have her tense and worried whenever she even thinks about it.

But she can forget, at least a little, when she is in his arms, her cheek pressed up against his scarred face.

 

_June, 1919_

Alayne’s had a long night, a couple of the girls not showing up for work, which meant that she’d had to sing two extra songs, and now there’s some sort of fight out the front which Sandor has to sort out, so when she’d got off stage she hadn’t even had him there to lift her spirits.

She has a headache, so as soon as she relaxes into the seat of her dressing table she releases her hair from the tight coronet and brushes out the snarls that have formed before herding it into one thick braid. As she ties it, she hears the door open. “I thought you had to sort out a squabble,” she begins assuming that it’s Sandor, but then she looks up and in her mirror sees that it isn’t her lover at the door, it’s a face that she recognises all too well, one that chills her to the core.

_Ramsay_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise answers in the next chapter. (Even though y'all have figured it all out already!)


	8. 1918

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The truth of 1918.

_March, 1918_

She is a fool.

Alayne has known it for a long while, but she’s ignored it as much as she can. She should have listened to Ros, but she didn’t because she didn’t care to, and now she will pay.

She doesn’t know why she let herself believe her own excuses, why she wanted to think otherwise. Maybe it was because of Sandor and the way her heart aches, unknowing as to whether he is alive or dead. Maybe she just didn’t want to face everything.

But she has to, for her blood hasn’t come in four months and now there is a small swelling in her belly.

She’d been ill a little, earlier on, and tried to pretend that an illness was the reason, because when she was fifteen she’d been sick enough that she hadn’t bled for a couple of months, but there’s no denying it.

She is carrying Sandor’s child.

She doesn’t really have any options - if Petyr finds out that she is pregnant, well, she doesn’t know what he would do, but it would never be good, and she couldn’t expose a child to his poisonous life, not when he has so destroyed hers, not when he looks at her in such a way, the same way that he looked at her own mother.

And there is no way that she can keep this from Petyr. She’s seen the size that some girls grow to in pregnancy, and she possibly only has a month or two left before he would notice for certain.

And she knows the ways to get rid of it, but whenever she thinks about it… she doesn’t know if she can.

It’s not that she thinks that abortion is a sin, and if it were different circumstances - if Petyr had forced himself upon her, or the father was just a man, then she would consider it more carefully - but _Sandor_ is in her mind and she doesn’t even know what he would want, he could hate the thought of having a child for all she knows.

But she doesn’t know what he wants, or if he is alive or dead or dying and she doesn’t know if she can bear destroying this remnant of him, and of the way she felt with him, and the care he took with her.

She brews herself moon tea, but it sits there in her cup for hours before she finally throws it away and cries.

 

_May, 1918_

It takes almost a month and a half for Ros to notice.

It surprises Alayne, the fact that no one has noticed anything particularly strange about her, although she’s loosened her bodice slightly and adjusted her dresses so that they don’t cling so well to her body.

Still, Ros keeps her back one night after the rest of the girls have gone and demanded to know when she plans on ‘taking care of it’.

“I’m not,” she says, and Ros balks.

“Oh, for the love of- do you realise what will happen if Baelish finds out? You’ll be fair game to him - at the very least. And the babe-”

“I’m not getting rid of it, Ros.”

The red-head rolls her eyes. “It can’t be as if the man is important to you, or if he is you’ve kept him very secret.”

Alayne frowns. “It’s Sandor. Scars, remember?”

“Oh give over, he left six months ago, and you’re what - three, four months in?”

Silently, Alayne disrobes so that her friend can see her body and the changes her child is causing. It’s more noticeable when unclothed, she knows, even with her height seeming to balance out the roundness somewhat.

“Oh, Sa- my poor girl,” Ros says finally. “You’re really going to go through with this, aren’t you.”

“Yes, I can’t not. It’s all I have of him-”

“And you can’t keep it, not if you want to stay here, and where else you’d find employment-”

“I know, Ros,” she says. “I’ve thought of all this, but I can’t-”

“Okay, calm down,” Ros says, and Alayne realises that there are tears brimming in her eyes and she wipes them away angrily. “I’ll help you.”

“I didn’t ask-”

“No, but you’ll need it.”

 

Alayne disappears one morning, late in May.

That they have to find someone to replace her songs is annoying, but when a couple of the girls go to check her rooms and find them empty but for a note saying _‘I’m sorry’_ , they begin to get worried.

All of them know that Baelish is Alayne’s father, know that despite her work he is determined to keep her safe or at least away from the rest of the world. And all of them know that his wrath will visit down all on them all.

But Alayne will not be found, and Littlefinger must be informed, and he is as furious as is expected.

Ros makes sure that nobody tells him anything, that the existence of Alayne’s scarred lover remains a secret, so that he will have no suspicion that she is in the family way.

When things have died down somewhat, she leaves early for work one afternoon, and with some detours she makes her way to another part of town.

The room is tidy, as is typical of Alayne - even when she’s hiding out, doing odd little sewing jobs to survive, she manages to make her surroundings pretty.

It’s impossible to not see that she is with child, now, her belly protruding even as she sits and sews.

“Ros!” she says, jumping up as the door opens. “How are things?”

“He’s angry, and trying to find you, but as far as I can tell no one has told him anything.”

“I’ve stayed inside, and the landlady brings me food, so no one really knows that I’m here.”

Ros looks sadly over her, and gives her a rare hug. “Keep yourself safe.”

 

_July, 1918_

The pains are growing, and Alayne abandons her sewing in favor of pacing back and forth across the room. Her back aches, and her feet are sore and her breasts are swollen, but she can’t sit still.

Another spasming pain hits her, and she forces herself to sit, gasp her way through it.

It’s too soon.

Far too soon.

She can’t let go of her babe, not yet.

 

Pain, and blood and pain, and she doesn’t want this but for her child, and finally the midwife says “Here they are,” and there’s a cry that wrenches at her heart. “A little girl,” the midwife tells her, and hands her the babe and forces her to push through the afterbirth.

The girl has a dusting of dark hair and is red and tiny and screaming, and she is _hers_ , her little Anna. Her breasts are aching, so she shows her nipple to the infant’s mouth, and after a moment or two she latches on and this pains her, too, because this is the one time that she will have her this close, give her anything but the beginning of life.

Grey eyes stare up at her, the same colour as Sandor’s and she can’t help but weep.

Alayne doesn’t pay much attention to the way the midwife bustles around, and then she is gone and Ros is sitting on the bed beside her, watching her with sad eyes.

“If you feed her it’ll take longer for your breasts to dry up,” she says, and Alayne hands Anna over reluctantly, tying up her bodice.

“I’m sorry that I couldn’t get here,” Ros continues, and Alayne just nods and holds her arms out for her baby once more. “You know that you have to give her up, love.”

“I know. Just let me have these few hours,” she replies, and Ros sighs and hands her over.

Later, after Anna has been rocked to sleep and swaddled against her chest, she gets Ros to pass her the tiny smock that she has sewed, finished but for the final touch. She tries not to let tears fall on the embroidered letters of her daughter’s name, and for once Ros doesn’t tell her some version of ‘ _you’re a foolish child_ ’.

Ros has to leave again soon enough, because Littlefinger knows of their friendship and to have them both missing would alert his suspicions, and Alayne is left alone to care for Anna in their final hours together.

She dresses her in the smock and wraps her in blankets, enough to keep her warm, and then into a basket she goes.

Outside the orphanage she kisses Anna’s forehead and places the basket on the steps, taking one last look at her before ringing the bell.

She’s around the corner before the tears start again properly.

 

Ten days more she stays in the that room, the air heavy, but she can’t let herself give in, not if she wants Anna to be kept away from Baelish. As soon as her milk dries up she is out of there, heading back to the same place that has caused all of this.

All she has with her is the clothes she wore when she left, hanging off her now that she’s hardly been able to eat, and she considers going to the club, but she knows exactly what will please Littlefinger the most.

She rings his doorbell almost at midnight, and the butler gasps at the sight of her.

“Miss Stone,” he begins, and then Baelish is at the door of the sitting room and has her pulled into his arms.

“I’m so sorry, Father,” she sobs, and her tears are real, even if they’re not for the reason he supposes. “I’m so sorry.”

“Hush, love,” he says, patting her hair and guiding her towards a sofa. “It’s all right, you’re here now.”

He gives her hot tea and a nip of brandy and tries to ask what happened, but she just mumbles about her uncles and their deaths and that she should have told him that she was fine, just that she thought there was nothing left for her anywhere, and he hurries her into the spare bed.

The next day she lets him dye her hair yet again and tells him that she wants to sing again, for everything to go back to normal.

And it does, except that she is different, so different now, and no one but Ros knows, although a couple of girls think that she simply lost a babe, and eventually her breasts aren’t sore anymore and she doesn’t dream of Anna’s cries, at least not most nights.

But Sandor is still in her head, Sandor and Anna, and then armistice comes and he does not return.


	9. June, 1919 - Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ramsay Snow, and another note.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is basically the reason why I wrote this entire story.  
> There's only one chapter left after this, so I hope that you like it, and thank you all very much for reading :)

_June, 1919_

Ramsay Snow is the most vicious bastard that Alayne has ever met, and she’s heard all the rumours of what he’s done to women.

And now he’s in her room.

And now Sandor is nowhere in sight.

She leaps up from her chair and turns to face him, but he’s almost upon her and then he is, grabbing her chin and clawing at her skirts.

“You’ve no idea how much it cost to get in here, pretty girl,” he sneers at her, and that frightens her more than it should because he’s supposed to be banned, but with some money he could get in, and then he’s in between her legs and trying to push up her dress and loosen his trousers at the same time and Alayne’s hands scrabble against the table.

_She can’t stop him_ , she thinks with horror, as he rips her drawers open, and as he looks down at his trousers her searching fingers find the handles of her sewing scissors. _This could be her only chance_ , she realises, and her fingers tighten and she swings her arm with all her might just as he looks up at her, triumphant.

His grin disappears as she stares at him, at the metal in his neck, at her bloody hand which drives the scissor blades in again, and again.

He falls to the floor, blood gushing from his throat.

Alayne drops the scissors.

Blood, bright and red on her hands.

The door bursts open and she looks up to see Sandor staring. “Alayne, are you-” He strides in, barely glancing at the body on the floor, and takes her face in his hands. “Did he hurt you? A girl said that they’d seen Ramsay.”

“I’m fine, Sandor, but I-”

He looks over her face carefully before bending to check the body for any signs of life.

“I had to, the scissors were the first thing I could find-”

“Alayne,” Sandor interrupts, “I’m not going to blame you for killing him.”

“He’s-”

“Yes, he’s dead,” he says, standing up and taking hold of her shoulders. “I’m going to have to tell Littlefinger, Alayne, he’ll find out anyway. But I’ll tell him that I was the one who killed him, keep his attention off you.”

She’s in shock, at what she’s just done, at what Sandor has offered, but still a memory comes into her mind, of a few days earlier, when Ros had received her usual message of Anna’s progress.

_“He knows,” she had said to Alayne, eyes wide. “He’s been seen there, asking about Anna, he knows.”_

“No,” she says to Sandor. “Tell him it was me. But as if he shouldn’t know.”

He hesitates for a moment before nodding and leaving the room.

Ramsay is dead. She has his blood on her hands. Ramsay is dead.

She crosses the room to the basin of water and slowly rinses her hands.

She is not sorry.

 

Littlefinger looks up as Sandor barges into his office in club.

“Clegane-” he begins, only for Sandor to cut him off.

“Ramsay Snow got into the club. Into Alayne’s dressing room.”

The man is out of his chair in a flash. “Is she alright? Have you taken care of it? And where the hell were you, I hired you to protect her-”

“You hired me to protect _all_ of the girls, and there was a fight out front about one of them. She seems fine, and he’s not going to be coming back here.” He pauses, then says; “He’s not going to be going anywhere.”

“You killed him?” Littlefinger asks, and looks surprised when he shakes his head. “Then-”

“Alayne stabbed him.”

“She- Killing someone isn’t something that a girl like her would take lightly-”

“She asked me not to tell you. That she’d be ashamed if you knew, but I figured that- well, it's your club, so.”

Sandor can see the man taking Alayne’s bait like he takes men’s gold. “I see.”

“I’d better take care of the body, I just thought you needed to know what happened.”

He makes to walk out the door, only for Littlefinger to call him back. “Don’t tell her I know, Clegane. And from now on, keep a better eye on her. I won’t have her come to any harm.”

With a short nod, Sandor leaves.

 

“He bought it,” Sandor says as he kneels by Ramsay’s body to lift it onto a sheet.

“Are you sure?” Alayne asks, laying down cloths to help soak up the blood. “He knows I did it, but doesn’t know that I know?”

Sandor grunts his assent. “I said that you’d feel ashamed if he knew.”

“Oh, he’d eat that right up,” she mutters. “He likes me to want his approval, the bastard.”

“I don’t understand why you wanted him to know in the first place.”

“Well, it’s sort of- Ros!” She drops the rest of the cloth and leaps over the mess to the door. “I need to share your dressing room.”

“What the hell- is that Ramsay Snow?”

“He got into my room, and he was- and Clegane accidentally killed him,” she blurts out. “Can we please-”

“Of course,” her friend says, pulling her from the room, but Alayne doesn’t miss the nod of approval that Ros gives Sandor.

It’s funny how some things bring people together.

 

The next morning Littlefinger summons her to his house and makes her stay for lunch. He begins with general enquiries as to her well being before putting down his cup of tea and asking, “I heard that Ramsay Snow accosted you last night.”

“Yes,” she manages to say, as the memories of his awful hands on her come flooding back. “Clegane… stopped him.

“And you witnessed Clegane kill him.”

“Yes,” she says, twisting her hands in her lap. “I’m not- I’m not sorry that he’s dead, though, not when he was- the things I’ve heard- Mr Clegane saved my life,” she finishes, and Littlefinger looks satisfied.

“I’m so very sorry that such a thing happened to you, my dear,” he says, brushing a finger across her cheek. “Perhaps you should stop singing at the club.”

“Oh, no. I don’t mind singing, and it’s the least I can do to repay you after all that you’ve done for me.”

“There’s no need to repay me for anything,” Littlefinger says greasily and kisses her forehead. “You’re worth all of it.”

 

Two days later, there is another note under her door.

Giving life and taking it.

Quite a capable girl.

She smiles, her suspicions confirmed.

 

Sandor is waiting in the wings as usual when Alayne comes off stage with a broad smile on her face.

She takes his arm, and before he can ask what has made her so happy, she opens her mouth and says, “I want to tell you everything.”

“Everything?” he asks, hardly believing her.

“Everything.”


	10. June, 1919 - Part 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The End.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this is the last chapter, and I hope you've all enjoyed the story! Thank you so much to all of you who commented, you made me so happy :)   
> Thanks to all of you for reading!

_June, 1919_

She won't risk the dressing room, not when she's so close, but it’s difficult to feign indifference backstage, to change her clothes with Sandor just outside the door and not call him inside. She is grateful all over again for Ramsay’s attack, because Sandor is now under orders to escort her home. (‘If he tries to touch you, tell me and I’ll make sure you never see him again,’ Petyr had told her, and she’d laughed in the privacy of her dressing room.) Now it's completely appropriate for them to leave together, rather than waiting nearby for the other to join them. She manages to walk three whole blocks with him silent by her side before she gives in, pulls him into an alley and kisses him, hard as she can, biting his lip so that he grips her tighter.

“We shouldn’t stay here,” Sandor says, but kisses her some more before eventually letting her go and directing her back to the street.

The confessions that she is going to make are ones that need privacy, not during a quick fuck in an alleyway, unfortunately.

But then they're at Sandor’s lodgings and up the stairs and in the door, and he hauls her up against him and kisses her. Too soon he pulls away, let's go completely, and says, “I should let you- you were going to talk about-”

“After,” she tells him, and lifts her skirt to pull her drawers down, barely getting them and her shoes off before he has her in his arms again. His hands squeeze her, slide over her, and then he grasps her dress, pulls it up, halting his kisses to slide it over her head and off her arms.

She stands before him naked but for her stockings and her lies, and Sandor throws her dress to the ground and looks at her - head to toe, toe to head, and stays there - and his clothes are coming off as fast as his fingers can manage so she turns and crosses the room to the bed, swaying her hips as much as she can manage. He catches her before she’s there, slow as she’s going, a hand on her breast and fingers slipping between her folds, and _oh_ -

She stops herself from giving in to his touch, so deliciously tempting, but there's a way she wants this to go, and it involves Sandor on his back, and the control in her hands. She turns to face him and then forces him around so that with one step he falls onto the bed and takes her with him, his cock pressing against her belly. He groans, and grabs her hips, and she balances herself against his chest with one hand and takes him in the other-

She can never get enough of the look on his face when she finally slides down over him, taking him in and filling herself, the way his fingers tighten and dig into her skin and how _alive_ he feels inside her. The noises he makes as she draws up and falls, how his hips jerk upwards as if there are parts of her that he hasn't reached-

“You said that you'd killed before the war,” she says suddenly, and Sandor freezes, then groans as she takes him in again.

His fingers tighten again, having slackened in shock, and brings her down hard the next time she rises “Want me to kill Baelish for you?”

The casualness of the offer gets her, his willingness to kill for her, and the thought of Sandor sticks a knife into Littlefinger’s chest gets her almost as hot as the thought of her own hand doing so, and she can't help but tighten around him.

“Fuck-”

“I can't have you involved, not openly, but if you know someone-”

“Yeah, I do,” Sandor says, breathing hard. “God, Alayne-”

“Sansa,” she interrupts him with. “My name is Sansa.”

His eyes go wide, and one of his hands squeezes her thigh, and he breathes her name, says, “Sansa,” like it’s a prayer.

 

“Why do you want Baelish dead now, when you didn't before?” Sandor asks her later, as they lie together, stretched out side by side, and Sansa suppresses a sigh.

She'd known she'd have to answer this when she'd brought up killing him, but she’d promised to tell Sandor everything anyway, and all of it is why she wants Littlefinger dead.

“I'll have to start at the beginning,” she warns him. “It's a long story.”

“And I’ve waited years,” Sandor replies. “I think I have the patience.”

She almost wants to laugh at that, but she supposes that he does, and she’s certainly grown more patient than she was when she first came to London - patient enough to wait this long to have her revenge - and so she presses a kiss against his cheek, and settles herself comfortably against him. “Well,” she says, “I suppose that it began with this bloody war. The Battle of Mons, if one must be specific…”

 

A daughter.

Sansa has-

And his-

Sandor is still having trouble getting a grip on it all, that Sansa bore his child, that she wants to get her back once Baelish is gone, for him to be a father in truth to this infant, Anna. It's not something he'd ever considered happening, that a woman would have his child willingly - he still can't believe that Sansa loves him, after all - but he will do anything for her, even try to be a father.

But by god Sansa is so young, younger than he had assumed Alayne to be, barely twenty, and whenever he thinks of it his hatred for Baelish grows, for to take advantage of a schoolgirl, one who had just lost her parents and her brother- never mind that he didn't touch her, because Sandor has seen how he looks at Sansa when he thinks she isn't looking.

Her story makes him want to gut the man himself, but he understands her worries, which is why he is on his way to see an old acquaintance.

He finally gets to the warehouse where he was based before the war and is glad to see that they're still there, by the look of the dark haired youth slouching against the wall and the wicked looking knife that he’s twirling between his fingers.

“I'm here to see Beric,” he tells him. “I've got a job.” The youth looks him over for a second before nodding and disappearing through the nearby door with a wave of his hand.

Sandor follows.

 

She walks with Petyr to the edge of the building and lets him kiss her on the cheek before continuing on to the backstage door.

She’s halfway there when she hears gunfire and a car engine roar.

By the time she runs back, Littlefinger is on the ground, bleeding.

“Father,” she shouts, and runs to him.

He’s gasping for breath and there’s blood spreading over his shirt and jacket.

“Alayne,” he says, blood on his lips. “My will… everything to you. And your Anna, I knew, wanted to take care of her for you, but you can now-”

“Father,” she sobs, and brings her face down close to his so that only he can hear her next words. “I knew,” she hisses. “I knew the notes were you. And Anna will be with me now, with both her parents.”

Petyr’s face crinkles in confusion, even through the undoubted pain. “What?”

“I love Sandor Clegane, ‘ _Father’_ ,” she says, and feels a dart of glee as his eyes widen. “I have for years, and I was never, and will never, be yours.”

“You-” he begins, only to turn and cough up blood onto the sidewalk.

“Me, Littlefinger. I have given life and taken it, but it seems that I’m better at the latter.”

She lets him watch her cry, fake tears running down her face and onto him as he struggles to speak through the blood and the gasps, a feeble grasp on her skirt.

He takes his last breath as people gather around, and his body turns limp, and Sansa is free.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you all like the final chapter and how it ended!


End file.
